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Title: A Tale of a Tub
Author: Jonathan Swift
Release Date: December, 2003 [EBook #4737]
[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
[This file was first posted on March 10, 2002]
Edition: 10
Language: English
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Transcribed by Stephen Rice. Additional proofing by David Price, email
ccx074@coventry.ac.uk. From the 1889 George Routledge and Sons "Tale of
a Tub and Other Works" edition.
A TALE OF A TUB
Contents
The Tale of a Tub:
Advert
To the Right Honourable John Lord Somers
The Bookseller to The Reader
The Epistle Dedicatory
The Preface
Section I.--The Introduction
Section II.
Section III.--A Digression Concerning Critics
Section IV.--A Tale Of A Tub
Section V.--A Digression In The Modern Kind
Section VI.--A Tale Of A Tub
Section VII--A Digression In Praise Of Digressions
Section VIII.--A Tale Of A Tub
Section IX.--A Digression Concerning The Original . . .
Section X.--A Farther Digression
Section XI.--A Tale Of A Tub
The Conclusion
The History Of Martin
The History of Martin
A Digression On The Nature . . .
The History Of Martin--Continued
A Project For The Universal Benefit Of Mankind
ADVERT
Treatifes writ by the fame Author, moft of them mentioned in the
following Discourfes; which will be fpeedily publifhed.
A Character of the prefent Set of Wits in this Ifland.
A Panegyrical Effay upon the Number THREE.
A Differtation upon the principal productions of Grub-ftree.
Lectures upon the Diffection of Human Nature.
A Panegyrick upon the World.
An Analytical Difcourfe upon Zeal, Hiftori-theo-phyfi-logically
confidered.
A general Hiftory of Ears.
A modeft Defence of the Proceedings of the Rabble in all Ages.
A Defcription of the Kingdom of Abfurdities.
A Voyage into England, by a Perfon of Quality in Terra Auftralis
incognita, tranflated from the Original.
A Critical Effay upon the Art of Canting, Philofophically,
Phyfically, and Mufically confidered.
TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE JOHN LORD SOMERS.
My LORD,
Though the author has written a large Dedication, yet that being
addressed to a Prince whom I am never likely to have the honour of
being known to; a person, besides, as far as I can observe, not at
all regarded or thought on by any of our present writers; and I
being wholly free from that slavery which booksellers usually lie
under to the caprices of authors, I think it a wise piece of
presumption to inscribe these papers to your Lordship, and to
implore your Lordship's protection of them. God and your Lordship
know their faults and their merits; for as to my own particular, I
am altogether a stranger to the matter; and though everybody else
should be equally ignorant, I do not fear the sale of the book at
all the worse upon that score. Your Lordship's name on the front in
capital letters will at any time get off one edition: neither would
I desire any other help to grow an alderman than a patent for the
sole privilege of dedicating to your Lordship.
I should now, in right of a dedicator, give your Lordship a list of
your own virtues, and at the same time be very unwilling to offend
your modesty; but chiefly I should celebrate your liberality towards
men of great parts and small fortunes, and give you broad hints that
I mean myself. And I was just going on in the usual method to
peruse a hundred or two of dedications, and transcribe an abstract
to be applied to your Lordship, but I was diverted by a certain
accident. For upon the covers of these papers I casually observed
written in large letters the two following words, DETUR DIGNISSIMO,
which, for aught I knew, might contain some important meaning. But
it unluckily fell out that none of the Authors I employ understood
Latin (though I have them often in pay to translate out of that
language). I was therefore compelled to have recourse to the Curate
of our Parish, who Englished it thus, Let it be given to the
worthiest; and his comment was that the Author meant his work should
be dedicated to the sublimest genius of the age for wit, learning,
judgment, eloquence, and wisdom. I called at a poet's chamber (who
works for my shop) in an alley hard by, showed him the translation,
and desired his opinion who it was that the Author could mean. He
told me, after some consideration, that vanity was a thing he
abhorred, but by the description he thought himself to be the person
aimed at; and at the same time he very kindly offered his own
assistance gratis towards penning a dedication to himself. I
desired him, however, to give a second guess. Why then, said he, it
must be I, or my Lord Somers. From thence I went to several other
wits of my acquaintance, with no small hazard and weariness to my
person, from a prodigious number of dark winding stairs; but found
them all in the same story, both of your Lordship and themselves.
Now your Lordship is to understand that this proceeding was not of
my own invention; for I have somewhere heard it is a maxim that
those to whom everybody allows the second place have an undoubted
title to the first.
This infallibly convinced me that your Lordship was the person
intended by the Author. But being very unacquainted in the style
and form of dedications, I employed those wits aforesaid to furnish
me with hints and materials towards a panegyric upon your Lordship's
virtues.
In two days they brought me ten sheets of paper filled up on every
side. They swore to me that they had ransacked whatever could be
found in the characters of Socrates, Aristides, Epaminondas, Cato,
Tully, Atticus, and other hard names which I cannot now recollect.
However, I have reason to believe they imposed upon my ignorance,
because when I came to read over their collections, there was not a
syllable there but what I and everybody else knew as well as
themselves: therefore I grievously suspect a cheat; and that these
Authors of mine stole and transcribed every word from the universal
report of mankind. So that I took upon myself as fifty shillings
out of pocket to no manner of purpose.
If by altering the title I could make the same materials serve for
another dedication (as my betters have done), it would help to make
up my loss; but I have made several persons dip here and there in
those papers, and before they read three lines they have all assured
me plainly that they cannot possibly be applied to any person
besides your Lordship.
I expected, indeed, to have heard of your Lordship's bravery at the
head of an army; of your undaunted courage in mounting a breach or
scaling a wall; or to have had your pedigree traced in a lineal
descent from the House of Austria; or of your wonderful talent at
dress and dancing; or your profound knowledge in algebra,
metaphysics, and the Oriental tongues: but to ply the world with an
old beaten story of your wit, and eloquence, and learning, and
wisdom, and justice, and politeness, and candour, and evenness of
temper in all scenes of life; of that great discernment in
discovering and readiness in favouring deserving men; with forty
other common topics; I confess I have neither conscience nor
countenance to do it. Because there is no virtue either of a public
or private life which some circumstances of your own have not often
produced upon the stage of the world; and those few which for want
of occasions to exert them might otherwise have passed unseen or
unobserved by your friends, your enemies have at length brought to
light.
It is true I should be very loth the bright example of your
Lordship's virtues should be lost to after-ages, both for their sake
and your own; but chiefly because they will be so very necessary to
adorn the history of a late reign; and that is another reason why I
would forbear to make a recital of them here; because I have been
told by wise men that as dedications have run for some years past, a
good historian will not be apt to have recourse thither in search of
characters.
There is one point wherein I think we dedicators would do well to
change our measures; I mean, instead of running on so far upon the
praise of our patron's liberality, to spend a word or two in
admiring their patience. I can put no greater compliment on your
Lordship's than by giving you so ample an occasion to exercise it at
present. Though perhaps I shall not be apt to reckon much merit to
your Lordship upon that score, who having been formerly used to
tedious harangues, and sometimes to as little purpose, will be the
readier to pardon this, especially when it is offered by one who is,
with all respect and veneration,
My LORD,
Your Lordship's most obedient
and most faithful Servant,
THE BOOKSELLER.
THE BOOKSELLER TO THE READER
It is now six years since these papers came first to my hand, which
seems to have been about a twelvemonth after they were written, for
the Author tells us in his preface to the first treatise that he had
calculated it for the year 1697; and in several passages of that
discourse, as well as the second, it appears they were written about
that time.
As to the Author, I can give no manner of satisfaction. However, I
am credibly informed that this publication is without his knowledge,
for he concludes the copy is lost, having lent it to a person since
dead, and being never in possession of it after; so that, whether
the work received his last hand, or whether he intended to fill up
the defective places, is like to remain a secret.
If I should go about to tell the reader by what accident I became
master of these papers, it would, in this unbelieving age, pass for
little more than the cant or jargon of the trade. I therefore
gladly spare both him and myself so unnecessary a trouble. There
yet remains a difficult question--why I published them no sooner? I
forbore upon two accounts. First, because I thought I had better
work upon my hands; and secondly, because I was not without some
hope of hearing from the Author and receiving his directions. But I
have been lately alarmed with intelligence of a surreptitious copy
which a certain great wit had new polished and refined, or, as our
present writers express themselves, "fitted to the humour of the
age," as they have already done with great felicity to Don Quixote,
Boccalini, La Bruyere, and other authors. However, I thought it
fairer dealing to offer the whole work in its naturals. If any
gentleman will please to furnish me with a key, in order to explain
the more difficult parts, I shall very gratefully acknowledge the
favour, and print it by itself.
THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY
TO
HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS PRINCE POSTERITY
SIR,
I here present your Highness with the fruits of a very few leisure
hours, stolen from the short intervals of a world of business, and
of an employment quite alien from such amusements as this; the poor
production of that refuse of time which has lain heavy upon my hands
during a long prorogation of Parliament, a great dearth of foreign
news, and a tedious fit of rainy weather. For which, and other
reasons, it cannot choose extremely to deserve such a patronage as
that of your Highness, whose numberless virtues in so few years,
make the world look upon you as the future example to all princes.
For although your Highness is hardly got clear of infancy, yet has
the universal learned world already resolved upon appealing to your
future dictates with the lowest and most resigned submission, fate
having decreed you sole arbiter of the productions of human wit in
this polite and most accomplished age. Methinks the number of
appellants were enough to shock and startle any judge of a genius
less unlimited than yours; but in order to prevent such glorious
trials, the person, it seems, to whose care the education of your
Highness is committed, has resolved, as I am told, to keep you in
almost an universal ignorance of our studies, which it is your
inherent birthright to inspect.
It is amazing to me that this person should have assurance, in the
face of the sun, to go about persuading your Highness that our age
is almost wholly illiterate and has hardly produced one writer upon
any subject. I know very well that when your Highness shall come to
riper years, and have gone through the learning of antiquity, you
will be too curious to neglect inquiring into the authors of the
very age before you; and to think that this insolent, in the account
he is preparing for your view, designs to reduce them to a number so
insignificant as I am ashamed to mention; it moves my zeal and my
spleen for the honour and interest of our vast flourishing body, as
well as of myself, for whom I know by long experience he has
professed, and still continues, a peculiar malice.
It is not unlikely that, when your Highness will one day peruse what
I am now writing, you may be ready to expostulate with your governor
upon the credit of what I here affirm, and command him to show you
some of our productions. To which he will answer--for I am well
informed of his designs--by asking your Highness where they are, and
what is become of them? and pretend it a demonstration that there
never were any, because they are not then to be found. Not to be
found! Who has mislaid them? Are they sunk in the abyss of things?
It is certain that in their own nature they were light enough to
swim upon the surface for all eternity; therefore, the fault is in
him who tied weights so heavy to their heels as to depress them to
the centre. Is their very essence destroyed? Who has annihilated
them? Were they drowned by purges or martyred by pipes? Who
administered them to the posteriors of -------. But that it may no
longer be a doubt with your Highness who is to be the author of this
universal ruin, I beseech you to observe that large and terrible
scythe which your governor affects to bear continually about him.
Be pleased to remark the length and strength, the sharpness and
hardness, of his nails and teeth; consider his baneful, abominable
breath, enemy to life and matter, infectious and corrupting, and
then reflect whether it be possible for any mortal ink and paper of
this generation to make a suitable resistance. Oh, that your
Highness would one day resolve to disarm this usurping maitre de
palais of his furious engines, and bring your empire hors du page.
It were endless to recount the several methods of tyranny and
destruction which your governor is pleased to practise upon this
occasion. His inveterate malice is such to the writings of our age,
that, of several thousands produced yearly from this renowned city,
before the next revolution of the sun there is not one to be heard
of. Unhappy infants! many of them barbarously destroyed before they
have so much as learnt their mother-tongue to beg for pity. Some he
stifles in their cradles, others he frights into convulsions,
whereof they suddenly die, some he flays alive, others he tears limb
from limb, great numbers are offered to Moloch, and the rest,
tainted by his breath, die of a languishing consumption.
But the concern I have most at heart is for our Corporation of
Poets, from whom I am preparing a petition to your Highness, to be
subscribed with the names of one hundred and thirty-six of the first
race, but whose immortal productions are never likely to reach your
eyes, though each of them is now an humble and an earnest appellant
for the laurel, and has large comely volumes ready to show for a
support to his pretensions. The never-dying works of these
illustrious persons your governor, sir, has devoted to unavoidable
death, and your Highness is to be made believe that our age has
never arrived at the honour to produce one single poet.
We confess immortality to be a great and powerful goddess, but in
vain we offer up to her our devotions and our sacrifices if your
Highness's governor, who has usurped the priesthood, must, by an
unparalleled ambition and avarice, wholly intercept and devour them.
To affirm that our age is altogether unlearned and devoid of writers
in any kind, seems to be an assertion so bold and so false, that I
have been sometimes thinking the contrary may almost be proved by
uncontrollable demonstration. It is true, indeed, that although
their numbers be vast and their productions numerous in proportion,
yet are they hurried so hastily off the scene that they escape our
memory and delude our sight. When I first thought of this address,
I had prepared a copious list of titles to present your Highness as
an undisputed argument for what I affirm. The originals were posted
fresh upon all gates and corners of streets; but returning in a very
few hours to take a review, they were all torn down and fresh ones
in their places. I inquired after them among readers and
booksellers, but I inquired in vain; the memorial of them was lost
among men, their place was no more to be found; and I was laughed to
scorn for a clown and a pedant, devoid of all taste and refinement,
little versed in the course of present affairs, and that knew
nothing of what had passed in the best companies of court and town.
So that I can only avow in general to your Highness that we do
abound in learning and wit, but to fix upon particulars is a task
too slippery for my slender abilities. If I should venture, in a
windy day, to affirm to your Highness that there is a large cloud
near the horizon in the form of a bear, another in the zenith with
the head of an ass, a third to the westward with claws like a
dragon; and your Highness should in a few minutes think fit to
examine the truth, it is certain they would be all chanced in figure
and position, new ones would arise, and all we could agree upon
would be, that clouds there were, but that I was grossly mistaken in
the zoography and topography of them.
But your governor, perhaps, may still insist, and put the question,
What is then become of those immense bales of paper which must needs
have been employed in such numbers of books? Can these also be
wholly annihilated, and to of a sudden, as I pretend? What shall I
say in return of so invidious an objection? It ill befits the
distance between your Highness and me to send you for ocular
conviction to a jakes or an oven, to the windows of a bawdyhouse, or
to a sordid lanthorn. Books, like men their authors, have no more
than one way of coming into the world, but there are ten thousand to
go out of it and return no more.
I profess to your Highness, in the integrity of my heart, that what
I am going to say is literally true this minute I am writing; what
revolutions may happen before it shall be ready for your perusal I
can by no means warrant; however, I beg you to accept it as a
specimen of our learning, our politeness, and our wit. I do
therefore affirm, upon the word of a sincere man, that there is now
actually in being a certain poet called John Dryden, whose
translation of Virgil was lately printed in large folio, well bound,
and if diligent search were made, for aught I know, is yet to be
seen. There is another called Nahum Tate, who is ready to make oath
that he has caused many reams of verse to be published, whereof both
himself and his bookseller, if lawfully required, can still produce
authentic copies, and therefore wonders why the world is pleased to
make such a secret of it. There is a third, known by the name of
Tom Durfey, a poet of a vast comprehension, an universal genius, and
most profound learning. There are also one Mr. Rymer and one Mr.
Dennis, most profound critics. There is a person styled Dr.
Bentley, who has wrote near a thousand pages of immense erudition,
giving a full and true account of a certain squabble of wonderful
importance between himself and a bookseller; he is a writer of
infinite wit and humour, no man rallies with a better grace and in
more sprightly turns. Further, I avow to your Highness that with
these eyes I have beheld the person of William Wotton, B.D., who has
written a good-sized volume against a friend of your governor, from
whom, alas! he must therefore look for little favour, in a most
gentlemanly style, adorned with utmost politeness and civility,
replete with discoveries equally valuable for their novelty and use,
and embellished with traits of wit so poignant and so apposite, that
he is a worthy yoke-mate to his fore-mentioned friend.
Why should I go upon farther particulars, which might fill a volume
with the just eulogies of my contemporary brethren? I shall
bequeath this piece of justice to a larger work, wherein I intend to
write a character of the present set of wits in our nation; their
persons I shall describe particularly and at length, their genius
and understandings in miniature.
In the meantime, I do here make bold to present your Highness with a
faithful abstract drawn from the universal body of all arts and
sciences, intended wholly for your service and instruction. Nor do
I doubt in the least but your Highness will peruse it as carefully
and make as considerable improvements as other young princes have
already done by the many volumes of late years written for a help to
their studies.
That your Highness may advance in wisdom and virtue, as well as
years, and at last outshine all your royal ancestors, shall be the
daily prayer of,
SIR,
Your Highness's most devoted, &c. Decemb. 1697.
THE PREFACE.
The wits of the present age being so very numerous and penetrating,
it seems the grandees of Church and State begin to fall under
horrible apprehensions lest these gentlemen, during the intervals of
a long peace, should find leisure to pick holes in the weak sides of
religion and government. To prevent which, there has been much
thought employed of late upon certain projects for taking off the
force and edge of those formidable inquirers from canvassing and
reasoning upon such delicate points. They have at length fixed upon
one, which will require some time as well as cost to perfect.
Meanwhile, the danger hourly increasing, by new levies of wits, all
appointed (as there is reason to fear) with pen, ink, and paper,
which may at an hour's warning be drawn out into pamphlets and other
offensive weapons ready for immediate execution, it was judged of
absolute necessity that some present expedient be thought on till
the main design can be brought to maturity. To this end, at a grand
committee, some days ago, this important discovery was made by a
certain curious and refined observer, that seamen have a custom when
they meet a Whale to fling him out an empty Tub, by way of
amusement, to divert him from laying violent hands upon the Ship.
This parable was immediately mythologised; the Whale was interpreted
to be Hobbes's "Leviathan," which tosses and plays with all other
schemes of religion and government, whereof a great many are hollow,
and dry, and empty, and noisy, and wooden, and given to rotation.
This is the Leviathan from whence the terrible wits of our age are
said to borrow their weapons. The Ship in danger is easily
understood to be its old antitype the commonwealth. But how to
analyse the Tub was a matter of difficulty, when, after long inquiry
and debate, the literal meaning was preserved, and it was decreed
that, in order to prevent these Leviathans from tossing and sporting
with the commonwealth, which of itself is too apt to fluctuate, they
should be diverted from that game by "A Tale of a Tub." And my
genius being conceived to lie not unhappily that way, I had the
honour done me to be engaged in the performance.
This is the sole design in publishing the following treatise, which
I hope will serve for an interim of some months to employ those
unquiet spirits till the perfecting of that great work, into the
secret of which it is reasonable the courteous reader should have
some little light.
It is intended that a large Academy be erected, capable of
containing nine thousand seven hundred forty and three persons,
which, by modest computation, is reckoned to be pretty near the
current number of wits in this island {50}. These are to be
disposed into the several schools of this Academy, and there pursue
those studies to which their genius most inclines them. The
undertaker himself will publish his proposals with all convenient
speed, to which I shall refer the curious reader for a more
particular account, mentioning at present only a few of the
principal schools. There is, first, a large pederastic school, with
French and Italian masters; there is also the spelling school, a
very spacious building; the school of looking-glasses; the school of
swearing; the school of critics; the school of salivation; the
school of hobby-horses; the school of poetry; the school of tops;
the school of spleen; the school of gaming; with many others too
tedious to recount. No person to be admitted member into any of
these schools without an attestation under two sufficient persons'
hands certifying him to be a wit.
But to return. I am sufficiently instructed in the principal duty
of a preface if my genius, were capable of arriving at it. Thrice
have I forced my imagination to take the tour of my invention, and
thrice it has returned empty, the latter having been wholly drained
by the following treatise. Not so my more successful brethren the
moderns, who will by no means let slip a preface or dedication
without some notable distinguishing stroke to surprise the reader at
the entry, and kindle a wonderful expectation of what is to ensue.
Such was that of a most ingenious poet, who, soliciting his brain
for something new, compared himself to the hangman and his patron to
the patient. This was insigne, recens, indictum ore alio {51a}.
When I went through that necessary and noble course of study, {51b}
I had the happiness to observe many such egregious touches, which I
shall not injure the authors by transplanting, because I have
remarked that nothing is so very tender as a modern piece of wit,
and which is apt to suffer so much in the carriage. Some things are
extremely witty to-day, or fasting, or in this place, or at eight
o'clock, or over a bottle, or spoke by Mr. Whatdyecall'm, or in a
summer's morning, any of which, by the smallest transposal or
misapplication, is utterly annihilate. Thus wit has its walks and
purlieus, out of which it may not stray the breadth of a hair, upon
peril of being lost. The moderns have artfully fixed this Mercury,
and reduced it to the circumstances of time, place, and person.
Such a jest there is that will not pass out of Covent Garden, and
such a one that is nowhere intelligible but at Hyde Park Corner.
Now, though it sometimes tenderly affects me to consider that all
the towardly passages I shall deliver in the following treatise will
grow quite out of date and relish with the first shifting of the
present scene, yet I must need subscribe to the justice of this
proceeding, because I cannot imagine why we should be at expense to
furnish wit for succeeding ages, when the former have made no sort
of provision for ours; wherein I speak the sentiment of the very
newest, and consequently the most orthodox refiners, as well as my
own. However, being extremely solicitous that every accomplished
person who has got into the taste of wit calculated for this present
month of August 1697 should descend to the very bottom of all the
sublime throughout this treatise, I hold it fit to lay down this
general maxim. Whatever reader desires to have a thorough
comprehension of an author's thoughts, cannot take a better method
than by putting himself into the circumstances and posture of life
that the writer was in upon every important passage as it flowed
from his pen, for this will introduce a parity and strict
correspondence of ideas between the reader and the author. Now, to
assist the diligent reader in so delicate an affair--as far as
brevity will permit--I have recollected that the shrewdest pieces of
this treatise were conceived in bed in a garret. At other times
(for a reason best known to myself) I thought fit to sharpen my
invention with hunger, and in general the whole work was begun,
continued, and ended under a long course of physic and a great want
of money. Now, I do affirm it will be absolutely impossible for the
candid peruser to go along with me in a great many bright passages,
unless upon the several difficulties emergent he will please to
capacitate and prepare himself by these directions. And this I lay
down as my principal postulatum.
Because I have professed to be a most devoted servant of all modern
forms, I apprehend some curious wit may object against me for
proceeding thus far in a preface without declaiming, according to
custom, against the multitude of writers whereof the whole multitude
of writers most reasonably complain. I am just come from perusing
some hundreds of prefaces, wherein the authors do at the very
beginning address the gentle reader concerning this enormous
grievance. Of these I have preserved a few examples, and shall set
them down as near as my memory has been able to retain them.
One begins thus: "For a man to set up for a writer when the press
swarms with," &c.
Another: "The tax upon paper does not lessen the number of
scribblers who daily pester," &c.
Another: "When every little would-be wit takes pen in hand, 'tis in
vain to enter the lists," &c.
Another: "To observe what trash the press swarms with," &c.
Another: "Sir, it is merely in obedience to your commands that I
venture into the public, for who upon a less consideration would be
of a party with such a rabble of scribblers," &c.
Now, I have two words in my own defence against this objection.
First, I am far from granting the number of writers a nuisance to
our nation, having strenuously maintained the contrary in several
parts of the following discourse; secondly, I do not well understand
the justice of this proceeding, because I observe many of these
polite prefaces to be not only from the same hand, but from those
who are most voluminous in their several productions; upon which I
shall tell the reader a short tale.
A mountebank in Leicester Fields had drawn a huge assembly about
him. Among the rest, a fat unwieldy fellow, half stifled in the
press, would be every fit crying out, "Lord! what a filthy crowd is
here. Pray, good people, give way a little. Bless need what a
devil has raked this rabble together. Z----ds, what squeezing is
this? Honest friend, remove your elbow." At last a weaver that
stood next him could hold no longer. "A plague confound you," said
he, "for an overgrown sloven; and who in the devil's name, I wonder,
helps to make up the crowd half so much as yourself? Don't you
consider that you take up more room with that carcass than any five
here? Is not the place as free for us as for you? Bring your own
guts to a reasonable compass, and then I'll engage we shall have
room enough for us all."
There are certain common privileges of a writer, the benefit whereof
I hope there will be no reason to doubt; particularly, that where I
am not understood, it shall be concluded that something very useful
and profound is couched underneath; and again, that whatever word or
sentence is printed in a different character shall be judged to
contain something extraordinary either of wit or sublime.
As for the liberty I have thought fit to take of praising myself,
upon some occasions or none, I am sure it will need no excuse if a
multitude of great examples be allowed sufficient authority; for it
is here to be noted that praise was originally a pension paid by the
world, but the moderns, finding the trouble and charge too great in
collecting it, have lately bought out the fee-simple, since which
time the right of presentation is wholly in ourselves. For this
reason it is that when an author makes his own eulogy, he uses a
certain form to declare and insist upon his title, which is commonly
in these or the like words, "I speak without vanity," which I think
plainly shows it to be a matter of right and justice. Now, I do
here once for all declare, that in every encounter of this nature
through the following treatise the form aforesaid is implied, which
I mention to save the trouble of repeating it on so many occasions.
It is a great ease to my conscience that I have written so elaborate
and useful a discourse without one grain of satire intermixed, which
is the sole point wherein I have taken leave to dissent from the
famous originals of our age and country. I have observed some
satirists to use the public much at the rate that pedants do a
naughty boy ready horsed for discipline. First expostulate the
case, then plead the necessity of the rod from great provocations,
and conclude every period with a lash. Now, if I know anything of
mankind, these gentlemen might very well spare their reproof and
correction, for there is not through all Nature another so callous
and insensible a member as the world's posteriors, whether you apply
to it the toe or the birch. Besides, most of our late satirists
seem to lie under a sort of mistake, that because nettles have the
prerogative to sting, therefore all other weeds must do so too. I
make not this comparison out of the least design to detract from
these worthy writers, for it is well known among mythologists that
weeds have the pre-eminence over all other vegetables; and therefore
the first monarch of this island whose taste and judgment were so
acute and refined, did very wisely root out the roses from the
collar of the order and plant the thistles in their stead, as the
nobler flower of the two. For which reason it is conjectured by
profounder antiquaries that the satirical itch, so prevalent in this
part of our island, was first brought among us from beyond the
Tweed. Here may it long flourish and abound; may it survive and
neglect the scorn of the world with as much ease and contempt as the
world is insensible to the lashes of it. May their own dulness, or
that of their party, be no discouragement for the authors to
proceed; but let them remember it is with wits as with razors, which
are never so apt to cut those they are employed on as when they have
lost their edge. Besides, those whose teeth are too rotten to bite
are best of all others qualified to revenge that defect with their
breath.
I am not, like other men, to envy or undervalue the talents I cannot
reach, for which reason I must needs bear a true honour to this
large eminent sect of our British writers. And I hope this little
panegyric will not be offensive to their ears, since it has the
advantage of being only designed for themselves. Indeed, Nature
herself has taken order that fame and honour should be purchased at
a better pennyworth by satire than by any other productions of the
brain, the world being soonest provoked to praise by lashes, as men
are to love. There is a problem in an ancient author why
dedications and other bundles of flattery run all upon stale musty
topics, without the smallest tincture of anything new, not only to
the torment and nauseating of the Christian reader, but, if not
suddenly prevented, to the universal spreading of that pestilent
disease the lethargy in this island, whereas there is very little
satire which has not something in it untouched before. The defects
of the former are usually imputed to the want of invention among
those who are dealers in that kind; but I think with a great deal of
injustice, the solution being easy and natural, for the materials of
panegyric, being very few in number, have been long since exhausted;
for as health is but one thing, and has been always the same,
whereas diseases are by thousands, besides new and daily additions,
so all the virtues that have been ever in mankind are to be counted
upon a few fingers, but his follies and vices are innumerable, and
time adds hourly to the heap. Now the utmost a poor poet can do is
to get by heart a list of the cardinal virtues and deal them with
his utmost liberality to his hero or his patron. He may ring the
changes as far as it will go, and vary his phrase till he has talked
round, but the reader quickly finds it is all pork, {56a} with a
little variety of sauce, for there is no inventing terms of art
beyond our ideas, and when ideas are exhausted, terms of art must be
so too.
But though the matter for panegyric were as fruitful as the topics
of satire, yet would it not be hard to find out a sufficient reason
why the latter will be always better received than the first; for
this being bestowed only upon one or a few persons at a time, is
sure to raise envy, and consequently ill words, from the rest who
have no share in the blessing. But satire, being levelled at all,
is never resented for an offence by any, since every individual
person makes bold to understand it of others, and very wisely
removes his particular part of the burden upon the shoulders of the
World, which are broad enough and able to bear it. To this purpose
I have sometimes reflected upon the difference between Athens and
England with respect to the point before us. In the Attic {56b}
commonwealth it was the privilege and birthright of every citizen
and poet to rail aloud and in public, or to expose upon the stage by
name any person they pleased, though of the greatest figure, whether
a Creon, an Hyperbolus, an Alcibiades, or a Demosthenes. But, on
the other side, the least reflecting word let fall against the
people in general was immediately caught up and revenged upon the
authors, however considerable for their quality or their merits;
whereas in England it is just the reverse of all this. Here you may
securely display your utmost rhetoric against mankind in the face of
the world; tell them that all are gone astray; that there is none
that doeth good, no, not one; that we live in the very dregs of
time; that knavery and atheism are epidemic as the pox; that honesty
is fled with Astraea; with any other common-places equally new and
eloquent, which are furnished by the splendida bills {56c}; and when
you have done, the whole audience, far from being offended, shall
return you thanks as a deliverer of precious and useful truths.
Nay, further, it is but to venture your lungs, and you may preach in
Covent Garden against foppery and fornication, and something else;
against pride, and dissimulation, and bribery at Whitehall. You may
expose rapine and injustice in the Inns-of-Court chapel, and in a
City pulpit be as fierce as you please against avarice, hypocrisy,
and extortion. It is but a ball bandied to and fro, and every man
carries a racket about him to strike it from himself among the rest
of the company. But, on the other side, whoever should mistake the
nature of things so far as to drop but a single hint in public how
such a one starved half the fleet, and half poisoned the rest; how
such a one, from a true principle of love and honour, pays no debts
but for wenches and play; how such a one runs out of his estate; how
Paris, bribed by Juno and Venus, loath to offend either party, slept
out the whole cause on the bench; or how such an orator makes long
speeches in the Senate, with much thought, little sense, and to no
purpose;--whoever, I say, should venture to be thus particular, must
expect to be imprisoned for scandalum magnatum, to have challenges
sent him, to be sued for defamation, and to be brought before the
bar of the House.
But I forget that I am expatiating on a subject wherein I have no
concern, having neither a talent nor an inclination for satire. On
the other side, I am so entirely satisfied with the whole present
procedure of human things, that I have been for some years preparing
material towards "A Panegyric upon the World;" to which I intended
to add a second part, entitled "A Modest Defence of the Proceedings
of the Rabble in all Ages." Both these I had thoughts to publish by
way of appendix to the following treatise; but finding my common-
place book fill much slower than I had reason to expect, I have
chosen to defer them to another occasion. Besides, I have been
unhappily prevented in that design by a certain domestic misfortune,
in the particulars whereof, though it would be very seasonable, and
much in the modern way, to inform the gentle reader, and would also
be of great assistance towards extending this preface into the size
now in vogue--which by rule ought to be large in proportion as the
subsequent volume is small--yet I shall now dismiss our impatient
reader from any further attendance at the porch; and having duly
prepared his mind by a preliminary discourse, shall gladly introduce
him to the sublime mysteries that ensue.
SECTION I.--THE INTRODUCTION.
Whoever has an ambition to be heard in a crowd must press, and
squeeze, and thrust, and climb with indefatigable pains, till he has
exalted himself to a certain degree of altitude above them. Now, in
all assemblies, though you wedge them ever so close, we may observe
this peculiar property, that over their heads there is room enough;
but how to reach it is the difficult point, it being as hard to get
quit of number as of hell.
"--Evadere ad auras,
Hoc opus, hic labor est." {59}
To this end the philosopher's way in all ages has been by erecting
certain edifices in the air; but whatever practice and reputation
these kind of structures have formerly possessed, or may still
continue in, not excepting even that of Socrates when he was
suspended in a basket to help contemplation, I think, with due
submission, they seem to labour under two inconveniences. First,
that the foundations being laid too high, they have been often out
of sight and ever out of hearing. Secondly, that the materials
being very transitory, have suffered much from inclemencies of air,
especially in these north-west regions.
Therefore, towards the just performance of this great work there
remain but three methods that I can think on; whereof the wisdom of
our ancestors being highly sensible, has, to encourage all aspiring
adventures, thought fit to erect three wooden machines for the use
of those orators who desire to talk much without interruption.
These are the Pulpit, the Ladder, and the Stage-itinerant. For as
to the Bar, though it be compounded of the same matter and designed
for the same use, it cannot, however, be well allowed the honour of
a fourth, by reason of its level or inferior situation exposing it
to perpetual interruption from collaterals. Neither can the Bench
itself, though raised to a proper eminency, put in a better claim,
whatever its advocates insist on. For if they please to look into
the original design of its erection, and the circumstances or
adjuncts subservient to that design, they will soon acknowledge the
present practice exactly correspondent to the primitive institution,
and both to answer the etymology of the name, which in the
Phoenician tongue is a word of great signification, importing, if
literally interpreted, "The place of sleep," but in common
acceptation, "A seat well bolstered and cushioned, for the repose of
old and gouty limbs;" senes ut in otia tuta recedant {60}. Fortune
being indebted to them this part of retaliation, that as formerly
they have long talked whilst others slept, so now they may sleep as
long whilst others talk.
But if no other argument could occur to exclude the Bench and the
Bar from the list of oratorical machines, it were sufficient that
the admission of them would overthrow a number which I was resolved
to establish, whatever argument it might cost me; in imitation of
that prudent method observed by many other philosophers and great
clerks, whose chief art in division has been to grow fond of some
proper mystical number, which their imaginations have rendered
sacred to a degree that they force common reason to find room for it
in every part of Nature, reducing, including, and adjusting, every
genus and species within that compass by coupling some against their
wills and banishing others at any rate. Now, among all the rest,
the profound number THREE {61} is that which has most employed my
sublimest speculations, nor ever without wonderful delight. There
is now in the press, and will be published next term, a panegyrical
essay of mine upon this number, wherein I have, by most convincing
proofs, not only reduced the senses and the elements under its
banner, but brought over several deserters from its two great
rivals, SEVEN and NINE.
Now, the first of these oratorical machines, in place as well as
dignity, is the Pulpit. Of pulpits there are in this island several
sorts, but I esteem only that made of timber from the Sylva
Caledonia, which agrees very well with our climate. If it be upon
its decay, it is the better, both for conveyance of sound and for
other reasons to be mentioned by and by. The degree of perfection
in shape and size I take to consist in being extremely narrow, with
little ornament, and, best of all, without a cover; for, by ancient
rule, it ought to be the only uncovered vessel in every assembly
where it is rightfully used, by which means, from its near
resemblance to a pillory, it will ever have a mighty influence on
human ears.
Of Ladders I need say nothing. It is observed by foreigners
themselves, to the honour of our country, that we excel all nations
in our practice and understanding of this machine. The ascending
orators do not only oblige their audience in the agreeable delivery,
but the whole world in their early publication of their speeches,
which I look upon as the choicest treasury of our British eloquence,
and whereof I am informed that worthy citizen and bookseller, Mr.
John Dunton, has made a faithful and a painful collection, which he
shortly designs to publish in twelve volumes in folio, illustrated
with copper-plates,--a work highly useful and curious, and
altogether worthy of such a hand.
The last engine of orators is the Stage-itinerant, erected with much
sagacity, sub Jove pluvio, in triviis et quadriviis. {62a} It is
the great seminary of the two former, and its orators are sometimes
preferred to the one and sometimes to the other, in proportion to
their deservings, there being a strict and perpetual intercourse
between all three.
From this accurate deduction it is manifest that for obtaining
attention in public there is of necessity required a superior
position of place. But although this point be generally granted,
yet the cause is little agreed in; and it seems to me that very few
philosophers have fallen into a true natural solution of this
phenomenon. The deepest account, and the most fairly digested of
any I have yet met with is this, that air being a heavy body, and
therefore, according to the system of Epicurus {62b}, continually
descending, must needs be more so when laden and pressed down by
words, which are also bodies of much weight and gravity, as is
manifest from those deep impressions they make and leave upon us,
and therefore must be delivered from a due altitude, or else they
will neither carry a good aim nor fall down with a sufficient force.
"Corpoream quoque enim vocem constare fatendum est,
Et sonitum, quoniam possunt impellere sensus."
- Lucr. lib. 4. {62c}
And I am the readier to favour this conjecture from a common
observation, that in the several assemblies of these orators Nature
itself has instructed the hearers to stand with their mouths open
and erected parallel to the horizon, so as they may be intersected
by a perpendicular line from the zenith to the centre of the earth.
In which position, if the audience be well compact, every one
carries home a share, and little or nothing is lost.
I confess there is something yet more refined in the contrivance and
structure of our modern theatres. For, first, the pit is sunk below
the stage with due regard to the institution above deduced, that
whatever weighty matter shall be delivered thence, whether it be
lead or gold, may fall plump into the jaws of certain critics, as I
think they are called, which stand ready open to devour them. Then
the boxes are built round and raised to a level with the scene, in
deference to the ladies, because that large portion of wit laid out
in raising pruriences and protuberances is observed to run much upon
a line, and ever in a circle. The whining passions and little
starved conceits are gently wafted up by their own extreme levity to
the middle region, and there fix and are frozen by the frigid
understandings of the inhabitants. Bombast and buffoonery, by
nature lofty and light, soar highest of all, and would be lost in
the roof if the prudent architect had not, with much foresight,
contrived for them a fourth place, called the twelve-penny gallery,
and there planted a suitable colony, who greedily intercept them in
their passage.
Now this physico-logical scheme of oratorical receptacles or
machines contains a great mystery, being a type, a sign, an emblem,
a shadow, a symbol, bearing analogy to the spacious commonwealth of
writers and to those methods by which they must exalt themselves to
a certain eminency above the inferior world. By the Pulpit are
adumbrated the writings of our modern saints in Great Britain, as
they have spiritualised and refined them from the dross and
grossness of sense and human reason. The matter, as we have said,
is of rotten wood, and that upon two considerations: because it is
the quality of rotten wood to light in the dark; and secondly,
because its cavities are full of worms--which is a type with a pair
of handles, having a respect to the two principal qualifications of
the orator and the two different fates attending upon his works.
{63}
